Our Strategic Plan

SSW Goal: SSW integrates the core values in everyday professional interactions through a public relations campaign, online learning modules, and integration of values into core processes.

Objectives:

• Develop a public relations campaign.
• Develop and implement mandatory online self-paced learning modules.
• Integrate the core values in admissions, course syllabi, field education, evaluation, performance reviews, and employee selection processes.

SSW Goal: SSW prioritizes excellence while ensuring an equitable, accessible, and inclusive culture and learning opportunities that address the varying needs of our students.

Objectives:

• Achieve growth in student diversity based on access to funding, scholarships, and equitable opportunities by prioritizing an antiracist and anti-oppressive framework.
• Reimagine coursework to enhance learning and promote consistency of expectations, quality, and accessibility.

SSW Goal: SSW fosters a culture of care for all employees in our community by strengthening processes and procedures to ensure transparency and equity in recruitment and retention.

Objectives:

• Develop a process for giving merit-based increases for faculty and staff.
• Communicate processes and procedures for promotions and recruitments.
• Create a staff development program.
• Mandatory faculty and staff DEI training.

SSW Goal: SSW becomes a leader in producing interdisciplinary collaborative research that includes the voice of vulnerable communities and individuals most affected to forward the cause of social justice and promote change. 

Objectives: 

• Expand interdisciplinary collaborations between SSW and UMB schools, USM and other institutions. 
• Invest in emerging methodology, emerging data sources and merging of different missions of the school (service, education, and research) e.g., SWCOS, Promise Heights, Institute, etc. 
• Develop innovative certificates or programs that make the SSW unique and a leader with other schools beyond the UMB campus.  
• Include community members and stakeholders in development of research questions and methods of data collection and analysis and interpretation of results. 

 

SSW Goal: SSW invests in and uses new information technology and data driven analytics to build knowledge and be more proactive in making change to better serve our internal and external stakeholders. 

Objectives: 

• Collect more robust data routinely on what we do, how we do it, and make meaningful use of that data to better serve our students and communities. 
• Prepare graduates to leverage emerging technology to provide state of the art social work services and evaluation (practice and technological pedagogies). 

 

SSW Goal: SSW engages in a bidirectional learning collaborative with partner communities for sharing expertise and knowledge in educational, research, and service activities.

Objectives:

• Train faculty in community based research principles.
• Increase attendance at community events.
• Participate in collaboratory research to track bidirectional learning collaborations.

SSW Goal: SSW enriches opportunities for global education and research through fostering new international partnerships and interprofessional UMB and USM initiatives.

Objectives:

• Increase scholarship support for student participation in global education programs.
• Build on and engage in the COIL model to enhance global education training and opportunities.